And Not to Yield
by flutterby-flower
Summary: This was not how he’d imagined his life when he was eleven years old, when all this terror was just a whisper and a shadow. The last few years of Voldemorts first rise to power were terrible times, but there were those who opposed him.
1. Chapter 1

**June, 1978: The Hogwarts Express**

It was an inexplicably dark and gloomy day for June, gray clouds rolling morosely over the sky, damp, cold mists rolling over the land from the north sea. Well, thought James miserably as he turned from the window, it wasn't really that inexplicable – the Dementors were breeding again. It was moments like this (though he'd never admit it) that he almost wished he were a Muggle, blissfully unaware of what was happening, rolling contently through life – until things he couldn't understand would happen and his family would be brutally murdered, just because they were there, just because they were Muggles. He sighed. This was not how he'd imagined his life when he was eleven years old, about to start at Hogwarts, when all this terror was just a whisper and a shadow. He was not off to be the greatest Chaser the world had ever seen, winning every game for England – his infuriating Gryffindor pride made sure of that. No, he, along with all three of his best friends in the world, had applied to be Aurors, determined to help save the world. And because the ministry was so desperate for Aurors in these times, all but one of them had been accepted – and the only reason they hadn't even considered Remus was because he was a werewolf, and they'd said bluntly that 'werewolfs are considered a security risk'. He tried not to think about that fact that most Aurors lasted mere months in the service before they were blasted out of existence – he was young, he was only eighteen, he was invincible. He sighed again.

'James?' Lily waved on hand in front of his face. 'Are you listening, James?'

'Huh?' he said, looking around the compartment. It contained all of the graduating Gryffindors that had chosen to take the train back – himself and Lily, Sirius, Remus, Peter and Lily's friend Marlene. The other two girls, Hestia and Sally, had been picked up by their parents earlier at Hogwarts. There were other students that had vanished from Hogwarts years ago – he could hardly remember their faces. None had been in his dorm, or particular scope of friends. Sirius grinned at him.

'I was telling the girls about my flat where we're all going to live – they were surprised by your seeming lack of enthusiasm.'

'I'm totally enthusiastic,' James said. 'Here I was, thinking I was finally free of seeing your ugly mug every day, and then I agree in some drunken moment to actually live with you after Hogwarts as well.'

'Not only that,' said Sirius cheerfully, 'you'll get to see my charming self every day at work as well, seeing as we're all going to be Aurors together.'

Remus snapped his book shut. 'Can we please talk about something other than our future careers?' he asked, sounding very bitter. Marlene glanced at him, startled.

'Aren't you going-' she began. Peter cut across her loudly. 'Padfoot, pass me the chocolate frogs, would you?' Marlene glanced curiously from Remus to Peter, but took the not-so-subtle hint and dropped the subject.

And so, for the rest of the train ride, they purposely ignored their uncertain futures, the darkness that awaited them, and instead played a very loud game of exploding snap, filling every explosion-free gap with happy reminisces of their time at Hogwarts ('hey Prongs, remember the time we set the suit of armour on Lily at Halloween and she thought it had come alive'… 'yes, Sirius, and then she cursed the both of you so bad you were breathing fire for days afterwards'… 'that was kind of fun, actually, we set Davy Gudgeon's hair alight twice after that…you'd think he'd learn after the first time…').

It was towards the end of the journey that it happened; after they'd all singed their eyebrows to some extent and Sirius was happily collecting his winnings from the latest game – James' copy of the Daily Prophet, Peter's last chocolate frog, Remus' book, Lily's quill and Marlene's right sock. In quick succession, six flashes of flame burst into the compartment, and from each one, a feather dropped at everyones feet.

At the first flash, all six had leapt up and drawn their wands, Sirius pulling the door open to stare up and down the train, Peter peering nervously out the window.

'What on earth?' exclaimed Lily, bending down and prodding the feather with her wand. 'I can't see anything outside' said Peter. 'And we're not slowing down or anything.' The train rattled on at full speed, and they looked at each other in some confusion. James couldn't help but think how depressing it was, when mere feathers could cause such paranoia in six adult witches and wizards. He slumped back onto the seat and picked up his own feather, twirling it between thumb and forefinger.

'Don't play with it, James,' said Lily worriedly. 'We don't know what it is.'

'It's just a feather, Lily,' he pointed out.

'Yes, but it could be a portkey or it could explode or – I don't know, don't you find feathers randomly appearing rather suspicious?' She glared at him, and he shrugged and dropped the feather onto the seat beside him.

'They're phoenix feathers!' Remus said, having levitated his to the level of his eyes. 'D'you reckon its from Dumbledore's bird?' Sirius asked.

'Dumbledore has a phoenix?' Marlene asked.

Sirius nodded. 'Yeah, Fawkes. It's always in his office – it burst into flame once when I was there.'

'Why would Dumbledore send us feathers?' asked Lily.

Sirius shrugged. 'To use as quills? It'd be kind of fun to have a phoenix feather as a quill…they have magical properties, so you'd probably be able to write one hell of an essay with it.' He picked his up and waved it round. 'Or we could always sell them to wand makers – yeoch!' He dropped it as it burst into flame once more. James hastily flicked his own flaming feather off the chair and onto the floor. Once the last sparks had died down, rolls of parchment were sitting where before had been feathers. James glanced at Lily, who had her wand trained on the parchments like they were about to jump up and attack. Then again, the feathers had burst into flame again and blistered Sirius' finger (which he was cooling with a burst of water from his wand), so maybe she had a point.

'Should we – should we have a look, do you think?' asked Peter nervously. 'I mean, they've got our names on them.'

Remus unrolled the one addressed to himself with his wand and cautiously levitated it to a level where he could read it. The rest followed suit, James pushing his glasses more securely onto his nose.

_If you are interested in the Order of the Phoenix, please be present at the Hog's Head on the 25__th__ of June at 10pm. You will receive further instruction there. Do not speak to anyone of this._

_APWBD_

He looked up at the others, who appeared rather confused.

'APWBD, that's got to be Dumbledore, right?' asked Lily.

'Wait!' said Remus. He waved his wand around them 'Muffliato!' At Lily and Marlenes questioning looks he explained 'Anti-eavesdropping charm.'

Peter shrugged. James frowned. 'It all sounds a bit woolly to me…if it was Dumbledore, why wouldn't he just ask us in person when we were still at Hogwarts?'

'Ouch!' Sirius dropped his parchment as it too burst into flame, but this time, it burnt into nothingness. 'Why am I the person who always gets burnt?' he whined, blowing on his fingers. 'Noone else was thick enough to hold onto objects that appear to be routinely bursting into flame,' Remus told him, staring at the spot where the parchment had been just moments before.

'Should we owl Dumbledore, to make sure this is for real?' Peter asked.

'Yeah, and have the owl intercepted by Death Eaters if its for real – not the best idea, Wormy,' said Sirius.

'But I don't know if we should just turn up there,' Lily said nervously.

'Umm,' said Marlene. 'I think we should. I've sort of heard of this before.'

The rest turned to stare at her. 'When?' asked Lily.

'At home last holidays – I overheard my parents talking about going to 'Dumbledore's Order meeting' one evening; I don't think they knew I was there, and I didn't tell them I'd overheard.'

'Well, it couldn't hurt just to turn up and see what happens,' said Sirius.

'There will be six of us, Lily, it'll be fine,' added James as she chewed her lip worriedly.

'I suppose we can always apparate out if – if things don't seem right,' she said.

'Maybe – maybe we should all meet up at the flat first, and travel together,' Peter suggested. 'Just in case, you know?'

They exchanged glances again, and nodded agreement.

'So,' said Sirius, 'if you two' and he pointed at Lily and Marlene, 'floo over sometime before 9.30, we can apparate from mine to – somewhere near the Shrieking Shack would be best, noone ever goes there.'

'I don't have Floo access, my parents are Muggles, remember?' Lily pointed out.

'Right, so apparate then – there's a park opposite the building, no one will be there that time of night and James will wait out there for you,' Sirius said.

**June 1978 – Platform Nine and Three Quarters**

James dragged his own and Lily's trunks off the train, and loaded them onto nearby trolleys, while Lily held an umbrella above both their heads. It had begun to drizzle just as the train pulled in. 'Thanks for that, James,' Lily said, squeezing his hand as they began to move along the platform towards the barrier with Kings Cross Station. He smiled at her, trying to ignore the grim presence of Aurors, who were marching up and down the platform, wands at the ready.

'Are you sure you're going to be ok, off in the Muggle world?' he asked.

'I'll be fine – it's probably safer there than anywhere in the wizarding world at the moment,' she said. 'Anyone muggle-baiting that comes across me isn't exactly going to be expecting a fully-trained witch to be there. Besides, my parents miss me. They haven't seen me since Christmas – and they don't get to spend much time with me since I started at Hogwarts. I'm hoping to be with them until I get my NEWT results and job offers and so on.' She glanced sideways at him. 'Are you going to your parents, or are you going straight to the flat?'

'Straight to the flat, but Mum made me promise to come over for dinner Sunday night. Dad hasn't been very well – they're not exactly young, you know – and he wants to see me.' He paused as an Auror sent them one at a time through the barrier.

'I was kind of wondering if maybe you'd like to come as well?'

'Are you sure?' Lily asked. 'I mean, they haven't seen you in a while and I don't want to be in the way or anything…'

'No, I want you to come,' mumbled James. 'My parents – they sort of want to meet you, you see…'.

Lily giggled, then wrapped her free arm up around his neck and kissed him thoroughly. Behind them, someone wolf-whistled. 'Look at the two love-birds' crowed Sirius. 'Can't even wait to get a room!'

James turned and scowled. 'Remind me why I'm friends with you, Padfoot,' he said. Lily rolled her eyes. 'How are you four planning to get to the flat?' she asked, scanning the crowd for her parents.

'Remus's mother is dropping us off there – he has to go home for the rest of the week,' Peter told her.

Marlene came over, looking somewhat rushed. 'I have to go – I'll see you on the 25th,' she said, hugging Lily. 'Don't forget to owl me!' She waved to the boys, and hurried off to where her parents were waiting.

Lily spotted her own parents in the throng and waved enthusiastically at them.

'Mum! Daddy!' she called. 'James, could you bring my trunk please?'

James complied, trailing along behind her and studiously ignoring Sirius's sniggers of 'whipped'.

Lily was hugging both of her parents in turn. 'Mum, Dad, you remember James, right?' she said. 'He came over once in the Christmas holidays.'

James winced as he remembered that particular incident – after Lily had assured him it would be fine for him to apparate into her backyard, he had scared the living daylights out of her sister who had been on the back porch at the time – the girl had been practically hysterical. However, both Lily's parents seemed to have forgotten the incident and her father shook his hand heartily.

'You must come over for lunch sometime, James,' said Lily's mother – what was her name again? He couldn't believe he'd forgotten. 'Although, perhaps not when Petunia is home – she might not take so kindly to your presence.'

Maybe they hadn't forgotten after all. 'I'm going to dinner at James's on Sunday night,' Lily informed her mother.

'Do you want to apparate straight there, or do you want me to come pick you up?' asked James.

'No, its fine, I can apparate there,' Lily said. 'The front lawn under that massive tree is okay for me to apparate to, right?' James nodded. Lily's parents glanced at each other. 'And will it just be the two of you?' asked Lily's mother.

'Mum!' said Lily. 'I'm eighteen, for goodness sake, don't be so picky!' Her face had flushed pink. 'No, my parents will both be there,' James said. Lily turned to her parents. 'I'll just be two seconds, if you want to head off – I'll catch up.' Her father had taken the trolley with her things on it from James already. Once her parents had were reassured that Lily would be fine on her own for a few moments and started towards there car, Lily caught both James' hands.

'Take care, alright?' she said softly, staring straight at him with her bright green eyes. James grinned at her. 'Don't worry about me – I'll be fine…eating junk food…riding on Sirius's motorbike…trying to work out how to clean my own clothes.'

Lily laughed and hugged him tightly, and then they were kissing again, and he was thinking that Lily wasn't usually so prone to public displays of affection, but he didn't really care, because she was soft and warm and her hair had a sweet fruity smell…

'I'll owl you tomorrow, ok?' she said, standing back.

He ran his hand through his hair, then grinned cockily at her. 'You're my favourite ex-Head Girl of Hogwarts, you know,' he told her. She smiled at him. 'I don't really think you're a big-headed prat anymore, you know…but don't get too confident, the Giant Squid is still a contender!' He laughed, and waved, and watched until she'd caught up with her parents and walked out of sight.


	2. Chapter 2

**June 25****th****, 1978 – Park Opposite Sirius's Flat**

The cat was often in the park at night – it like to catch mice and rats and other small creatures there. But tonight…tonight something was not the same. It stared fixedly at a spot just beyond the swings in the playground. Seconds later, with a faint popping sounds, a cloaked figure appeared. The cats hackles raised, and it hissed. The figure spun around, and light burst from the end of her wand. The cat turned and scampered off into the night.

'Just a cat…' murmured Lily. 'Nox'. And the light at the end of her wand was extinguished.

Something dropped from a tree to the ground beside her, and she leapt to one side, uttering a hastily stifled scream. 'Scare you?' said James Potter, ruffling his hair and grinning.

'My heart nearly jumped out of my chest, you prat!' she said, swatting his arm.

'Good thing it didn't,' he smirked. 'I like your chest just the way it is.'

She rolled her eyes. 'I swear you get more obnoxious every day, Potter.'

'Yeah, but you like me anyway, don't you,' he grinned, wrapping his arms round her waist.

'I don't know why,' she grumbled, glancing left then right before crossing the road. 'It must be because you've got a Gringotts account full of galleons.'

'It's because you think I'm handsome…' he singsonged at her. 'I heard you tell my mother so…'

'I did not! I told her the baby photos of you were cute. That's entirely different, Potter.'

'Alohomora.' The door to the building swung open, and James closed it behind them.

'The flat's on the third floor.'

Lily groaned. 'Have they got a lift?' she asked.

'A lift?' said James.

'It's like a box, that moves up and down, so you don't have to go up the stairs,' she explained.

'Whacked. Tell you what, if you don't want to walk up the stairs…' and he grabbed her round the waist and lifted her off the ground.

'Hey! Put me down, Potter!'

'The lady didn't want to walk' he said, and attempted to heave her over his shoulder. 'Oomph!' And the two of them went crashing to the ground.

'Ouch!' Lily extracted herself from the tangle of robes and limbs. 'I told you not to do that, idiot…' James stood up, looking contrite.

'Well, you were a bit heavier than I was expecting…' he explained. She raised an eyebrow at him. 'Err…I was less strong than I thought?' he tried.

* * *

'What took you two so long?' demanded Sirius as he opened the door to let them in. 'Peter was sure you'd been attacked by the swing or something…'

'Um, not quite,' said Lily. 'James thought he'd, well, try to carry me up the stairs-'

'And she caused us to overbalance, and was very apologetic about it,' grinned James.

'That's not quite how I remember it happening, but it'll do,' said Lily, poking James in the ribs.

'Umm, James?' Marlene said. 'You have some lipstick on your face…next to your mouth…no, other side.'

James scrubbed his face indignantly with his sleeve. 'You actually wear that stuff just so moments like this happen, don't you,' he told Lily accusingly.

'Right,' said Remus. 'We'll apparate to under the sign near the Shrieking Shack, then once we get there, walk ten paces away. The next person to apparate will wait fifteen seconds, then follow…what?'

'You worry about these things too much,' said Peter, shaking his head.

'Tell that to me when we're calling in the Ministry because you and Sirius have apparated on top of each other and managed to merge yourselves into some sort of Pad-tail mixture,' Remus told him.

'That might be kind of interesting, you know…' said Sirius thoughtfully. 'But we'll do that some other time,' he added hastily, 'when we aren't going to slightly suspicious feather-ordered meetings.'

'I'll go first,' said Marlene, and she vanished from the flat with a pop.

A few minutes later, they were all standing on the road to Hogsmeade by the Shrieking Shack.

'I hate apparating,' said Peter mournfully. 'It makes my ears ache.'

'At least you didn't leave them behind this time,' sniggered Sirius. 'Remember his first licensing test? That was funny, that was.'

'Freakin hilarious,' said Peter sourly, as they rounded the corner into the village.

'Everything looks, well, peaceful, doesn't it?' said Lily, gazing out towards Hogwarts and the lake. 'You'd never guess, would you, that the people in this village would probably stun us as soon as speak to us…that some Death Eaters could turn up any minute and blast us all into nothing?' Marlene squeezed her arm.

'Don't think about that, Lily, we're all going to come out of this just fine.'

'I'd like to think we'd put up some resistance before we were blasted into nothing, and blast some of them up too,' said Sirius, scowling darkly, suddenly looking a whole lot different to the light-hearted boy he'd been moments earlier.

'Yeah,' said Peter. He reached out to knock on the door of the Hogs Head, but it swung open before his hand.

'Well,' said Remus, 'let's just go straight in, shall we?' And they marched into the dark, slightly smokey bar.

**June 25****th****, 1978 – The Hogs Head, Hogsmeade Village**

'What do you want,' grunted the man behind the bar. He was tall and thin, with a long beard that was possibly greying, though it was hard to tell, as it was as grimey as the cloth he was wiping dusty glasses with.

'Err,' James glanced at the others. 'We're here about a feather.'

The bartender didn't even blink. 'Straight up the stairs and to your left,' he said.

'Okay. Um, thanks?' said James, and they traipsed up the stairs. As they rounded the corner to their left, Lily grasped her wand firmly in the pocket of her cloak – but it was unnecessary.

'Welcome,' said the voice of Albus Dumbledore, 'to the Order of the Phoenix.'

There must have been close to twenty people crowded into the small room, round a rickety wooden table. Some Lily recognised, like Frank and Alice Longbottom, who'd been a few years above them at Hogwarts, and but most she didn't.

'Before I start explaining,' said Dumbledore, beaming at them all, 'please take a seat.'

The six of them squished into the room and found their way to a free bench, Marlene smiling at her parents over the room.

'Excellent!' said Dumbledore. 'Now, I am sure you would all like to know why you are here – and the reason is quite simple. All of us in this room have one objective, and that is to hinder the actions of the man who calls himself Lord Voldemort' - a collective shudder ran through much of the room – 'through whatever action we can take.' Lily gripped James' hand. 'We all know that the Ministry is hard-pressed to cover everything – we are here to do what they cannot, but in a strictly inofficial capacity. We also will do what they will not, whether it be because they are bound by regulations or years of what can only be called ineptitude.' He peered over his glasses at them. 'We are a group of people who will trust each other with their lives. And your lives may be at risk, doing what you will commit to do if you choose to remain at this meeting – but you may risk them knowing that you are fighting for your lives, the lives of others, and the freedom of all. You do not have to stay – you may walk out now, have a nice drink in the pub, and forget all about this. That is up to you.'

There was a moment of silence. Then, in perfect unison, Sirius and James spoke up. 'I'm in,' they both said. Lily tugged on James hand, and he turned to face her, her eyes frantically staring in his, trying to see what was in his mind, trying to get his reassurance that she, too, was capable of volunteering on what frankly seemed like a suicide mission…

'I'm in,' Remus said, almost wearily.

'Me, too,' said Peter.

Marlene just nodded, silently, grimly. All eyes turned to Lily. She took a deep breath. She let it out again. 'Yes,' she said. 'I'll do it.'

Later, sitting on the floor at the boys flat, she wondered if she'd made the right decision.

'This is…this is big,' she told James, leaning against his shoulder. 'Mmhmm,' he said, twirling one of her curls around his finger.

'We could die doing this. We can't die, we're too young! We only just got out of school; this isn't supposed to be what happens to us. Our lives are not meant to be like this.'

'That's right,' said James. 'And that's why we have to do this. Because no one else's lives should be like this. And if we don't fight for it, it'll be too late.'  
Across the room, Sirius downed a glass of firewhiskey. Remus and Peter were supposedly playing chess, but she could tell they were just going through the motions, pretending everything was normal.

If it were normal, they would be out partying and having fun, and Sirius would be smiling, and she wouldn't be scared out of her wits by a cat, and none of them would have volunteered to possibly die today. If it were normal, crazy psychopaths with a thing about death would not go around murdering everyone in their way, randomly killing Muggles just because they could…

'Death Eaters,' said Lily.

'What?' said James, sharply.

'I mean, what sort of name is Death Eaters? Who would pick that? It sounds stupid! Like some sort of overdone rock band or something.'

James stared at her for a minute, then smiled.

'Your mind astounds me sometimes,' he said. 'You've got to be the only witch you thinks that Death Eaters is rock band rather than evil incarnate. Perhaps you should suggest a career change to You-Know-Who when we run into him next.'

Lily laughed shakily, and James wrapped his arms around her.

'Lily,' he said. 'While we're having a deep and meaningful conversation, can I ask you something?'

'Sure, go ahead,' she said.

'It's just…well, I was kind of going to save it for a special moment or something, but now, with, well, you know, all that's happening, I don't really want to wait…you know I really really like you?'

'Yes…'

'Well, I probably more than like you, I actuallysortofloveyouandreallyreallywantyoutomarryme.'

Lily pulled back and stared at him. 'What?'

'I know it's probably way too soon, we're only eighteen, but I just-'

James was cut off as Lily launched herself at him and kissed him furiously.

'Oi!' said Sirius. 'Please remember there are other people present in this room!' And he chucked a stray cushion across the room at them.

'Is this a good thing,' gasped James, pulling away.

'It's a very emphatic yes, you prat!' said Lily, flinging her arms around him again.

James grinned in a rather dazed manner.

Sirius, Remus and Peter looked curiously at the pair of them.

'Err, is it just me or are we missing something here?' said Peter.

'He,' said Lily, stabbing a finger into James's chest, 'just asked me to marry him!'

'Oh Merlin,' said Sirius. 'You didn't agree did you?'

'I think she did,' said Remus as Lily dove in for another kiss.

'He's doomed,' said Peter mournfully (he'd consumed what was probably a bit too much firewhiskey courtesy of Sirius).

'On the bright side,' said Sirius thoughtfully, 'I'm sure this means we get to have a bachelor's party!'


	3. Chapter 3

August, 1978 - Hogwarts

**August, 1978 - Hogwarts**

'You know,' grumbled Sirius as they pointed their wands at the ceiling, 'I'm sure that when Dumbledore said we may be risking our lives by joining the Order, he didn't mean that we would be possibly crushed be the ceilings of secret tunnels.'

'I can't believe that we are destroying passageways out of Hogwarts,' said James. 'After all they did for us!' He watched somewhat depressedly as the roof collapsed in front of them, effectively sealing off the passageway.

'Well, if we could find these, so could Death Eaters,' said Remus reasonably, adding some magical shields to the pile of earth and rocks. 'And we don't exactly want them getting into the castle.'

'Yeah, but noone seemed to worry about that all the time we were here!' said Peter.

'Yes they did – remember after Filch discovered the one behind the griffin in 4th year – he sealed off the exit to that one,' Sirius pointed out.

The four of them clambered out from behind the mirror and closed it behind them.

'What's left?' asked James. 'Just the hump-backed witch,' said Peter.

'And the Whomping Willow,' pointed out Remus.

'It's got the Willow on top, Moony – and its outside anyway. Besides, noone knows about it cept us!' Sirius said.

'Snape knows,' said Remus quietly.

'They'd have to get in through the Shrieking Shack, anyway,' said Sirius. 'And Dumbledore sealed that up pretty well.'

'James,' said Peter as they walked up the stairs. 'Have you changed your mind about being an Auror?'

James looked startled. 'How'd you know?'

'I was talking to Moody and he said you withdrew your application.'

'Yeah, well I was thinking – I don't need a job at the moment, you know I have plenty of money, and I thought I could just, you know, do stuff full-time for the Order.'

'Besides,' said Sirius, 'I quit the Auror program too, and he didn't think he could cope without me.'

'You quit too?' said Peter. 'What am I supposed to do there all by myself?'

'You don't have to do just what we do, Wormtail,' said Sirius impatiently.

'It's not fair of you two to quit and leave me there by myself!' said Peter indignantly.

'Aren't we supposed to be a team?'

James looked guiltily at Sirius. 'If you really want to be an Auror, Petey, you should stick with it, you know?'

'But,' said Remus, 'you don't have to. I still need someone to back me up against these two.'

Peter didn't even hesitate. 'I'm owling in my resignation tomorrow,' he said. 'I don't think I could hack it without you guys.'

* * *

**August, 1978 – The Flat**

Sirius watched thoughtfully as his best friend charmed invitations to his wedding. He'd never imagined any of them getting married, not even after James started going out with Lily. Even now, he found it rather surreal that for the first time in over seven years, one of them would be moving apart from the others, becoming something other than a Marauder, having a family and best friend other than one of them – and he was a little bitter that it was his best friend that left first. He would never say it to Remus and Peter (though he was fairly sure they knew anyway) but he minded James leaving much more than he would Remus or Peter. After all, he and James had been friends from the moment they crashed into each other crossing the barrier into the platform – more than friends, practically brothers. And now, James was moving out. Which reminded him…

'Oi Prongs,' Sirius said. 'Where exactly are you and Lily going to live after you get hitched?'

James looked rather startled. 'Err, we haven't actually thought about that,' he said.

Sirius laughed. 'You can't surely be thinking of just staying here! Lily would hate it! And it's not like you'd exactly want to live with either sets of parents.'

James groaned and pushed away the piles of parchment. 'I can't believe we didn't think of this!' he said. 'I'll have to tell her now, or we'll end up leaving the wedding with no where to go.'

'D'you want to borrow my owl?' said Sirius, starting to get up from where he was sprawled on the floor.

'Nah, I got Lily a mirror like ours,' James said, and pulled his out of his pocket. 'Lily Evans!' he said firmly.

Sirius sunk back to the ground and stared sulkily at the window. This was another way Lily was poaching his best friend – it used to be just him and James who had the mirrors, so they could annoy each other even when they weren't in the same room. And now James had let Lily in – and Sirius didn't think it was fair. He scowled at the swirling mist he could see through the windowpane – maybe he could blame his moodiness on the ever-present gloom of the Dementors. He rummaged in his pocket and pulled out a half-eaten, slightly dusty chocolate frog. 'Spose it won't kill me,' he muttered and crammed the whole thing into his mouth. Seconds later, he nearly choked when James grabbed him in a chokehold from behind.

'Hey! What are you trying to do, kill me?' Sirius grumbled.

'If I do, can I have your broomstick?' James said.

'No, I'm giving it to Wormtail. He will give it the respect it deserves.'

'Wormtail hasn't flown since he hit that tree in third year!' James said indignantly.

'Precisely,' said Sirius smugly. 'It'll be safely stored in a Sirius-shrine...flowers offered up every day...gifts of food for the dead...'

'Complete waste,' James muttered. 'I wouldn't gift food to a dead person - ghosts can't even eat.'

'If I were a ghost, I could,' Sirius grinned. 'Now that we've established that you're not going to kill me-'

'Wouldn't be so sure...' James interjected

'-what exactly was the point of that vicious attack?'

'I'd nearly forgotten,' James said, brightening. 'You'll never guess what Lily's parents did!'

'Told their daughter to marry a better chap than you – me, perhaps?' said Sirius.

'No, they love me. So much, in fact, they bought Lily and me a flat in the same building as you as a wedding present!'

'So when Lily realises that you are actually still a big-headed prat, she can bail out and one of us can rescue her?' suggested Sirius, grinning back at James.

'No, you stupid hound, so she can pinch all that sugary crap you and Peter keep hidden under the sink whenever she wants!'

Later, when Lily was over telling Remus and Peter about the amusing search she'd had for a venue with her mother, and James and Sirius were fooling about, she'd turned and winked at him. It was then that he realised that perhaps Lily wasn't actually going to steal his best friend away from him, and that she'd probably told her parents where to buy the flat, and that maybe out of respect for her he shouldn't get James completely drunk the weekend before the wedding and take him to that spot with the exotic dancers…


	4. Chapter 4

September 5th, 1978

**September 5th, 1978 **

James wasn't really listening to the chatter of the person beside him. Niles Pepperdine, his fellow Order member, was a nice enough chap, but he never seemed to shut up – and when going to check up on someone the Order was protecting, James really didn't feel like small talk.

As they rounded the bend of the road, and came out of the trees, a strange green glow seemed to be cast around them, and Niles trailed off into silence.

'Oh, crap!' James pulled his wand out of his pocket and sprinted towards the house – the Dark Mark hovered ominously above it.

'D'you think – d'you think they're still here?' panted Niles behind him.

'Don't think so,' said James grimly, as they drew level to the front gate. 'There's muggles swarming over the place.'

'I'll get them out,' said Niles. 'You check the house?'

James nodded.

'Everyone come away from the house please!' called Niles, flipping an official looking badge out of his pocket (as a member of the accidental magic reversal squad, he'd had a lot of practice dealing with these sort of situations.) 'We'll take it from here. If you could all please wait on the front verge, I'd like to take a statement from you all…'

James walked cautiously up to the front door, which hung from its hinges. He could tell immediately upon walking into the house that someone had fought for their life here – furniture was upturned and smashed, there were gouges from stray spells on the walls, and – 'damn it damn it damn it' – there was a body flung out over the sofa.

He hurried over to check – they were most definitely dead and it was also most definitely Carlotta Pinkstone, strong advocate for overturning the statute of secrecy.

He stood up and checked the house for the presence of others: 'Homenium revelio!'

Nothing. A quick check showed no dead attackers either – not that he was really expecting any. He suspected anyone who died in Voldemort's service was taken back to become Inferi. A sudden wave of nausea overcame him and he rushed outside to vomit in the flowerbeds.

'You alright?' Pepperdine asked, walking up the path.

'Yeah,' said James, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. 'She's dead.'

'I'll let Dumbledore know,' said Pepperdine, not looking surprised. He raised his wand and a whoosh of silver went flying off.

'Any Muggles see anything?' asked James, straightening up.

'No – noone noticed anything til early this morning when they saw the mark. I expect the Death Eaters came at night. I've modified a few memories though – just of the people who went inside and saw wizarding paraphernalia.'

'Can we take that thing down?' said James, gesturing at the Mark.

'It usually blasts away ok once it's been up for a while,' Pepperdine said.

James swished his wand, and the Mark dissolved into a cloud of smoke. 'What happens now?' he asked. 'To – you know – the body.'

'We'll inform the Registry at the Ministry,' Pepperdine told him. 'They'll send someone out to get her and arrange for a funeral – let her family know.'

James nodded, feeling guilty suddenly that they hadn't come earlier, hadn't waited for dawn, hadn't left a woman alone here in a house to be brutally murdered...

'We couldn't have done anything more, Potter,' Pepperdine said, seemingly reading his mind. 'We don't have enough people to have round the clock guards on everyone.'

'Yeah, I know. I just – you know, if we'd done a little bit more, put up one more protective charm – we could've saved her, maybe.'

Pepperdine shrugged. 'We do our best, but we can't save everyone.'

'I'm getting married tomorrow,' James told him. 'I'm getting married, and I spend the day before my wedding discovering dead bodies.'

* * *

**9th of November, 1978**

James walked in the door to the apartment building and shook the water out of his hair. He'd spent the last 8 hours standing in the rain outside of the Muggle parliament, keeping watch for Death Eater activity. The Aurors and Magical Law Enforcement staff had been pulled of the job only last week, with the Minister deciding that they were stretched too thin and for now ought to focus on wizarding areas. Disgruntledly, he pulled out his wand and dried his clothes as he walked up the three flights of stairs to where his apartment was (three doors down from Sirius's).

'Snidget,' he said disinterestedly to his front door, which opened in front of him. Lily had set the front doors of both flats to be password opened as a security measure.

'Hey,' said the girl herself, wrapping her arms around his middle. He slid his cold hands under her jumper, and Lily yelped. 'Cut it out! Keep your iceblock fingers to yourself!'

'I spend 8 hours freezing half to death,' complained James, 'and my own wife won't let me warm them up.' He grinned at her…he hadn't quite gotten over the fact that Evans had actually married him. Lily smiled back and kissed him on the nose.

'There's hot chocolates on the bench. Once you've got yourself one, you should go talk to Sirius. He came over three hours ago, parked himself on our couch and hasn't moved since.'

James raised his eyebrows as he picked up the hot mug. 'What's wrong with him? Nothing's happened to Remus or Peter, has it?'

'No,' said Lily. 'They're still both at the hospital in Edinburgh. I'm supposed to be meeting them there in five minutes with Dearborn to take over.' She picked up her cloak from the table. 'I'll be back at about seven tonight, ok?' A quick kiss later and she was apparating out of the entrance hall, wand firmly grasped.

James grabbed some butterbeer and marched into his lounge-room, where Sirius was entrenched among the cushions, staring morosely at the fire.

'What's up, Padfoot?' he said, holding out one of the butterbeer. Sirius didn't take it.

'My brother is dead,' he said. James nearly choked on his mouthful of hot chocolate.

'What-when?'

'Andromeda owled me this afternoon – one of the cousins told her.'

'Your parents didn't tell you?'

Sirius kicked the coffee table. 'Dromeda says he went missing a month ago – I didn't even know! How could I not know that my own brother is dead!' he shouted.

James was silent, unsure of what to say. Death was different, so close to home. Sirius picked up one of the bottles of butterbeer and downed half of it.

'He joined the Death Eaters, you know,' he said.

'He – he did?' James said cautiously.

Sirius snorted. 'You know my family – they love Voldemort and his pure-blood ideals. Reg joined up nearly a year ago.' He paused. 'Apparently…apparently Narcissa told them he'd wanted out.' Another pause. 'Stupid kid – you can't just resign from something like that! The only way you leave is dead!'

'At least,' James said hesitantly, 'at least he'd wanted to leave. That's got to mean something, right?'

Sirius shrugged. 'He probably just chickened out. Didn't have much guts.' He took another long drink of butterbeer. 'He was only seventeen, you know.'

James nodded.

'He was only seventeen, and now he's dead, and I didn't know, and there's not even a funeral and if there was, I wouldn't go.' Sirius looked over at James. 'Am I as bad as them, Prongs? Because I wouldn't go to my own brothers funeral? Because I left him behind, I abandoned him and I shouldn't have let him do it!' He hurled the bottle at the wall. It smashed loudly, and glass scatted everywhere. 'Fuck it, I'm sorry, Prongs, I didn't mean to mess up your house, I'm sorry…' And then Sirius was crying like he'd never cried before, and James didn't know what to do, so he sat there in stunned silence, staring at the butterbeer that ran down the wall in sticky brown lines.

It seemed like an age before he stopped, but eventually they were both sitting there in silence.

'I don't think you're a bad person, Padfoot,' James said. 'If you were…' he cleared his throat. 'If you were, you wouldn't care this much.'

Sirius didn't say anything for a minute, then he pulled out his wand, pointed it at the wall and muttered 'Evanesco!' The shattered glass disappeared, and the stain on the wall vanished. 'Got any firewhiskey?' he muttered.

James summoned a bottle and two glasses to the room, and poured it out. 'To Regulus,' he said, lifting his glass slightly. Sirius paused for a moment, then raised his own glass, then downed the lot. 'To my brother,' he muttered, as he sat the glass with a slightly shaking hand on the table.

James sat down his own glass and wondered who else would die before all this was over, how many more lives would be destroyed, and why all this had to happen to them. And when Remus and Peter got back from Edinburgh, he got out the gobstones set and they ate bertie botts and pretended to forget for a moment that people were dying, because if they didn't James was sure they'd go mad.

* * *

_A/N  
For those wondering who on earth Niles Pepperdine is, he's one of a few original characters I created to flesh out the Order little... close reading of books five and seven shows the photo Moody shows Harry is taken about a month before Harry's first birthday - ie not until 1981. Quite frankly, I don't believe all the Order members would have lived that long, so the original characters will probably sacrificed in battle by me before I get to that point. Hope that clears it up!  
flutterby_


	5. Chapter 5

November 22nd, 1978 – Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix, Arabella Figg's House

**November 22****nd****, 1978 – Headquarters of the Order of the Phoenix, Arabella Figg's House**

It was after midnight, it was cold, and Peter Pettigrew was not fond of Arabella Figgs dusty cake. Sure, it was nice of her to leave some out (along with the kettle and a seemingly endless supply of coffee) for whomever was stationed at the headquarters, keeping track of who was where, relaying messages if necessary – but because she put in the effort, baking cakes and leaving them there even when away at her daughters, Peter felt obliged to eat it. And frankly, it made him feel ill. He swallowed the last dry crumbs and washed it down with some more tepid coffee. It would be another long, boring night (though, he reminded himself, boring was good, boring was what they wanted, boring meant no one was getting killed). He glanced at the parchment on the table – Dearborn and Remus were supposed to be finishing any minute at Downing Street, and the Prewett brothers should be checking in on their way to take over. Sure enough, just as he swalled the last of his coffee, a pigeon-shaped patronus swept in and Gideon's voice whispered 'We've just swapped over – nothing to report.'

'1 o'clock and all is well,' said Peter. His voice sounded loud in the still darkness of the world around him. 'More coffee, I think.'

'Put some on for me too, please,' said a tired voice at the door.

'Remus!' Peter stood up. 'What are you doing here?'

Remus pulled off his cloak and sunk into the couch.

'Getting something to eat – there's nothing at the flat, I think Sirius has been on the rampage again.' He reached for the cake on the bench.

'You do know that it is dusty and rather gross?' said Peter, pouring boiling water into the coffee mugs.

'Yes,' said Remus. 'It also has a high sugar content, which at the moment tips the balance in its favour.' He took a sip of the coffee, then rubbed his eyes tiredly. 'Kinda makes you wish we were back writing essays, doesn't it?' he said.

Peter laughed half-heartedly, glancing again at his parchment sheet. Nope, nothing coming up for another half hour – hopefully. Then why was a Patronus flying through the wall now?

'Who's is that?' said Remus, heaving himself to his feet.

'Can't tell,' said Peter. The patronus was flickery and vague in form. 'This can't be good, right?'

Remus had already drawn his wand. Then Frank Longbottom's voice filled the room.

'Aurors-ambushed….Dementors…northern Scotland…Azkaban…'

The patronus gave a last feeble flicker and faded out. 'Shit!' Peter grabbed his own wand. 'Who should I call?'

'Try Moody!' Remus said. He was already throwing floo powder in the fire. 'James' flat!' he shouted.

Peter shot his rat Patronus out to Moody with the message Frank had sent contained, followed by an identical one to Lemuel Tweedale, who worked in the Department of Magical Law Enforcement and might know the exact location of the patrol in question.

Remus pulled his head out of the fire, followed hurriedly by the bodies of James and Sirius.

'Where's Lily? Is she ok?' James asked worriedly.

'She's with Marlene at a hospital in east London,' Peter said. 'There's been an attack on Aurors, in north Scotland – something to do with Azkaban. Frank sent word.'

'Do we know where they are?' Sirius asked, pacing the room.

'I've asked Moody and Tweedale,' Peter told him.

'Here comes Tweedales reply now!' Remus said, as another silvery Patronus swooshed into the room.

'Unsure of location. Searching now.'

'Not helpful!' shouted Sirius, kicking at the door.

Moody's patronus swept in. 'Patrol on coast of North Sea near Rosehearty. On our way. Meet us there.'

'Who's with him?' demanded James. Peter checked his parchment.

'Fenwick – they were both in Edinburgh, they should be there by now.'

'Where the fuck is Rosehearty?' Sirius said, scanning a map on the wall.

'Near Macduff, right there on the coast,' Remus stabbed at it with his finger.

'Right, Sirius Remus and I will go there now, Pete you'll have to stay here to keep everyone informed – make sure you tell Dumbledore.' James apparated out without further ado, followed promptly by Sirius.

'Contact the Pepperdines as well – we don't know how many we'll be up against,' said Remus before following them out.

Peter sank back into his chair, back into the silence, alone again. The night was no longer boring, and he wished it were. Rubbing his temples, he straightened up and sent off two more messages – one to Hogwarts, for Dumbledore, and one to the Pepperdines in Yorkshire.

* * *

**On the coast of Scotland, near Rosehearty**

It was raining when they arrived at the outskirts of Rosehearty, and cold…a kind of unnatural cold, that froze your bones, froze your very soul…the hairs on the back of James neck rose.

'Where're Moody and Fenwick?' shouted Sirius beside him. Remus shot off a Patronus, which fled to his right.

'This way!' he yelled and they sped off, trying to keep the silvery mist in sight –

'Where'd it go?' Sirius said, stopping and spinning on the spot, trying to see past the foggy rain. He lifted his wand to set off his own Patronus to Moody, when –

'Hang on!' shouted James. Fenwick's patronus came speeding up to them, then turned and led them on, past the Muggle buildings and roads, down onto the vast empty beach. Moody and Fenwick were standing there, just above the reach of the icy-cold waves, wands out and defensive.

'They're 10 miles to the north,' said Moody hurriedly. 'We'll apparate to within half a mile – don't want to be too close, just in case…at three.' He held up three fingers and folded them down one by one; as the last turned down James spun on the spot and apparated, popping back into the pitch darkness, sensing the others appear beside him (they'd learned to keep the sound of their apparition down.)

'Dementors,' hissed Sirius, as the intesified cold ran over them in strong, chilling waves…they could see the light of spells clashing and jarring the darkness in front of them.

'Expecto Patronum!' Moody roared and they scattered from where they'd been standing as his Patronus burst out and circled round, chasing off Dementors – and seconds later jets of green light went flying past where they'd been standing. James ran, ran up the beach to where the Aurors were pinned down, ducking in and out among the rocks on the beach… 'Stupefy!' he shouted as a Death Eater started some sort of slashing motion with his wand – the man fell and hit a rock with a sickening crunch, but James ran on. There were more Dementors here than he'd ever seen in his life…he'd had no idea there were so many…suddenly all he could think of was that they were going to die here, there were too many…the face of Carlotta Pinkstone, dead and savaged flickered in front of his eyes…

'Expecto Patronum!' Sirius' great dog leapt out at the dementors and they fled, Sirius reaching out an arm to haul James behind a boulder as a jet of purple light flew past. (he didn't know what it did but was sure it would be bad). 'Thanks,' he said, sending out his own Patronus.  
'We've got each others backs, remember?' Sirius said, sticking his head out the side and pulling it back in as more green light swooshed past. 'Did you see the Aurors anywhere?'

'They're the other side of us and the Death Eaters,' panted Remus, who was behind the boulder next to them.

'How many of them?' James asked.

'Lots,' Remus said grimly. 'I just hope Peter got hold of the Pepperdines, and Tweedale was able to tell them exactly where we are.' He stuck his wand out the side of the rock and let out a barrage of spells; James and Sirius followed suit, before leaping out and darting forward to another boulder. The five patronuses now circling the area, keeping it dementor free, were also acting like giant torches, illuminating the action – James could just see the Aurors, maybe 60 metres away from him, when – 'Shit shit shit!'

James pulled his head back behind the rock.

'What?' hissed Sirius and Remus in almost perfect unison.

'Voldemort's there! I just saw him! He blasted an Auror to pieces, oh crap, I can't believe this is happening…'

Moody and Fenwick let loose a stream of curses to their left and the three of them took the opportunity to move forward again…James saw something hit Alice and she crumpled, Frank reaching out to catch her, and Voldemort disarmed him with one lazy wave of his wand…

'Portus!' hissed James, pointing his wand at a stone on the ground. He stood up fully

('James! What the fuck are you doing, get down!') and screamed 'Frank!'. Frank's head turned towards him, recognition and terror in his eyes. James lobbed the stone – Voldemort gave a scream of fury and aimed a blasting curse at it but missed – James dropped to the ground behind the boulder and peered round the side once more – and Frank caught the stone, five years of Chasing for the Gryffindor Quidditch team come in handy, and was portkeyed out, Alice with him.

'Get out, get out, get out!' James could hear Moody shouting, but he couldn't apparate, when he tried, it seemed to throw him back out…

'Anti-apparition wards!' hissed Remus. 'Get back along the beach, quick!'

And they sprinted as fast as they could crouching, dodging behind stones, until at last the barrier fell and they could apparate and did, James flashing into Rosehearty, then two random villages he didn't recognise in quick succession, then finally, back to Arabella Figgs where Dumbledore and McGonagall where just stepping out of the fireplace and Frank was kneeling by Alice's side where she lay sprawled out on the floor and Peter was pale and scared in the corner.

'Is anyone else back?' James demanded. 'Did they get back?'

Peter shook his head. 'No, you're the first-'

He was cut off as first Remus, then Fenwick burst in through the door, both panting, Fenwick nursing a broken arm. 'Alice – is Alice ok?' he gasped, sinking to the floor.

McGonagall was crouched over her, feeling her neck, her head, while Frank stood in the corner, pale faced and shaking.

Moody clattered in, followed closely by Sirius, and James breathed a sigh of relief – they'd all made it back, they were all ok.

'She's alive,' McGonagall said tersely. 'I'll take her to St Mungos – you come with me, Frank.' Frank glanced at Dumbledore, who said,

'I'll speak to you there, Frank.'

'Portus!' McGonagall said, waving her wand at a feather, and still holding Alice's wrist, placed a finger firmly on it. Frank did likewise, and in a flash of blue light, they were gone.

'What happened?' Dumbledore asked, blue eyes sweeping over each one of them in turn.

Remus hastily explained about Franks Patronus, how he and Peter had contacted people, that they'd gone immediately to the Scottish coast – 'and there was a shitload of Dementors, there, Professor – scuse my language,' Sirius interrupted.

'Voldemort was there as well,' James said, shuddering. 'I saw him, he was attacking the Longbottoms – Frank'd lost his wand, I tossed him a Portkey,'

'And we got the hell out of there,' finished Fenwick, who'd just finished splinting his arm.

'The other two Aurors?' Dumbledore asked heavily.

'I saw one get blasted – he was gone, Professor,' James said.

'One was kissed,' said Moody. James twitched – the Dementors Kiss was not something he like to think about. Dumbledore nodded.

'Thank you, for what you all did tonight,' he said. 'I am sorry I cannot stay any longer – I must go speak to Frank at St Mungos, and contact the Minister. Moody, the DMLE must be informed about its' Aurors…'

Moody nodded and headed out the door, taking a swig from his hip flask as he did.

'I'll come to St Mungos as well,' Fenwick said, moving his arm and wincing. 'I don't feel game to fix this myself.' Dumbledore nodded to each of them in turn, then he and Fenwick Flooed out, leaving the boys in silence.

'That,' Sirius said finally, 'was the scariest fucking thing I have done in my whole life.' He was tapping his wand against the table, seemingly unaware of what he was doing. James nodded, staring fixedly at the wall – he couldn't get the image of the Auror being blasted to pieces out of his mind, pieces of human flesh flying into the sky, then raining down again… He shook his head, trying to clear it of his macabre thoughts.

'Did you see his face?' Remus said softly. 'Did you see his eyes? It wasn't even human, it was…it was…'

'Evil,' finished Sirius tersely. Remus gripped his hair with his fingers.

'I don't think I can do this again,' he said softly, almost in a whisper. 'I can't stand to see us out there, all those curses…and the Dementors…'

Peter shuddered. James only then noticed how tightly Wormtail was gripping the side of the desk – his knuckles were white with tension. However bad it is out there, he told himself, you have the adrenaline to keep you going. Back here, there was nothing but the intolerable wait, and the wonder if your friends, the people you saw every day, would come back alive or dead or not at all…

* * *

_A/N Rosehearty and Macduff are actually both towns near the northern coast of Scotland, however I have no idea how big they are/what the beaches are like, so if you live there please excuse any completely obvious errors! _


	6. Chapter 6

**22****nd**** December, 1978**

'…it is my belief,' Dumbledore was saying, 'that Voldemort has decided to use Azkaban as – well, as headquarters, if I may call it that – it is an ideal location for him to hold, as he can incarcerate whom he will there, and it is easily defensible from outside penetration. We should therefore concentrate as much as possible on the coastline of the North Sea, in order to ward off any Dementors he may send from there to areas of Muggle Britain.' He glanced around the crowded room over the top of his spectacles. 'I need scarcely remind you to be certain of your ability to produce a corporeal Patronus under pressure before you volunteer for any duties in northern England.'

James sighed and squirmed a little in his seat – thirty people in Arabella's lounge room made for slightly squashy seating arrangements. Beside him, Lily was struggling to conceal her yawns – she'd come straight from a ten hour shift in a popular muggle shopping area, watching the pre-christmas crowds. She wasn't the only one looking tired – most of the people in the room were looking haggard bleary-eyed; especially those who had jobs as well as assisting the Order in any way they could. He peered round Clementine to the grandfather clock in the corner – half past nine. Hopefully Dumbledore would finish quickly and he could get home for some sleep before he had to be at a childrens hospital in Yorkshire at 3am. Damn- Moody had gotten to his feet, and he could be a bit long-winded at the best of times…

'The Minister,' Moody said, 'has after much pressure from myself and the Longbottoms, agreed to reallocate several Magical Law Enforcement staff to the ful-time surveillance of Downing Street, the Parliamentary buildings and Buckingham Palace, so our own commitments in those areas will significantly lessen.'

'Finally!' said Lily. 'She should never have removed them in the first place!'

'It was all a bit hectic last year,' Peter pointed out. 'I mean, what with two attacks on Muggle-borns in Diagon Alley, and attempted break-ins at Gringotts, and the Aurors being called out to sightings all over England every minute of the day – not to mention no less than twenty of them died in the line of duty.'

'That still doesn't mean the safety of important areas of Muggle England should have been compromised,' Lily said crossly. 'It's bigotism at its worst!'

'Well, they're going back, aren't they?' James pointed out.

'That's not the point,' Lily hissed at him. Oops. James backpedaled hastily.

'Well, err, it wasn't like they were completely abandoned…the Order was still there, remember, Bagnold had just removed the, err, government protection. And she hadn't removed her contacts from MI6, had she?'

Lily blinked at him. 'The Ministry has people in MI6?'

James nodded. 'Yeah, they have ever since it started up – there's always one or two wizards employed there. And there's a whole department somewhere that knows all about us, to coordinate security and that sort of thing – anyway, the point is, if we'd received any information about attacks on the Muggle Government, the wizards in their intelligence service can get people evacuated, that sort of thing.'

'Wow,' said Lily. 'That's really quite amazing.'

James nodded. 'Yeah, and there's a surprising amount of wards around some of those Muggle buildings you know – from back years ago. Of course, they've had to tone it down a bit over the years – modern muggle technology doesn't mix so well with magic, but there are still certain protections there; anti-apparition wards, shield charms, I think there's even some dragon-repelling spells cast on Westminster.'

Lily raised her eyebrows. 'How do you know all this, anyway?'

James grinned slightly sheepishly. 'My Dad was involved in the Department that coordinated all this, years ago – I, um, wasn't always as far away as he thought I was when he had people over.' Lily rolled her eyes at him, but she was smiling slightly.

'It sounds fascinating,' she said. 'I'd love to do that sort of thing.'

'I suppose I could introduce you to someone in the Department – you know, after all this is over,' James said hesitantly. There was a pause, then Lily flung her arms around him, her eyes watering a little.

'Hey,' he said, 'it's only an introduction…what's with the drama?'

Lily shook her head at him slightly. 'Not that…the 'after all this is over'.' Her fingers twitched slightly in his. 'I just like…I just like hearing you say that this will all be over one day, and we can have normal jobs like normal people…' Her voice trailed off, and she turned her head back to where Moody was still speaking. James squeezed her hand gently, then wrapped one arm around her waist, a deep-down part of his mind thinking that maybe, just maybe, if he held onto her enough they'd be together and safe through all this, and there _would_ be an afterwards, as he'd so casually said but was unsure if he truly believed.

'…so,' Moody was saying, 'if we could start surveillance on the homes of both known and suspected Death Eaters by the start of January, we should be able to keep tabs on their movements, and even get pre-emptive strikes before they launch any attacks. Obviously we'll have to be very vigilant – they'll probably have all sorts of nasty curses protecting their homes – and if anyone has invisibility cloaks, you might want to use them. I have two which I'll be lending to the Order to use – of course, we won't have enough for everyone but Disillusionment Charms are always good. All of you who are willing to do this, just give your names to Arabella and she'll fit you in on the roster.' He nodded to Dumbledore, and clunked back to his seat, swigging a mouthful of what James could only presume to be firewhiskey from a flask at his hip as he did.

'Is there anything else of which we should be made aware?' asked Dumbledore, looking up from his roll of parchment.

'Abraxas Malfoy was at the Ministry the other day,' Tweedale said. 'Chatting away to the DMLE head – probably trying to squeeze some information from him about the new Muggle Protection Detail.' A small murmur ran through the room.

'Crouch wouldn't say anything, surely?' one of the Prewett brothers said sharply. Tweedale shrugged gloomily. 'I wouldn't think so – he has very strong feelings about Death Eaters and the like – but he and the Malfoys have family connections, and it's not like Abraxas has ever been implicated in anything.'

'But didn't you say just last week that you were sure Lucius Malfoy had been seen in the presence of known Death Eaters? And he married one of the Black girls – we know quite well that their family was very vocal in it's supports of Voldemort's aims in his early years,' protested Dorcas Meadowes. James, who'd been wishing Sirius was there to keep him entertained and out of morbid thoughts of the future, was suddenly glad he was still at some hospital in north-west England – comments about his charming family rarely kept Sirius in a good mood.

'Our suspicions may lead us to conclude that the Malfoys are involved with Voldemort,' said Dumbledore heavily, 'but not all of our reportings are taken as absolute by those at the Ministry. You must not forget that the Malfoys have always been careful to keep their name unsullied, and to avoid any situations that could cause incontrovertible proofs of their activities coming to light at the Ministry – and even in this day and age, one must still presume innocence until proven guilty.'

Beside him, Moody gave a sceptical snort. 'Yeah, presume them innocent until they murder someone under your very nose – assume they're all guilty as hell, I say, and catch them before they catch you.'

There was a slightly awkward pause. Dumbledore steepled his fingers and pressed them against his nose.

'Keep me informed of Malfoy's activities at the Ministry,' he said to the room at large. 'Alastor is right – we must not be too liberal in our assumptions of innocence.'

He lowered his hands and smiled a little. 'Do not forget to tell Arabella when you are available for any duties the Order may have for you. And now, if you will excuse me, I have been away from Hogwarts for far too long – I must be off.' He swept to his feet with a swish of long, starry blue robes and strode towards the door.

'Was Dumbledore saying that we should presume the Malfoys to be innocent?' Peter hissed in James' ear. Lily answered before James had time to reply – even when dead on her feet, she was quick.

'No, Petey, he thinks the Malfoys are right in the thick of it. It was just one of those Dumbledore things, you know – he thinks that trust and justice are important, and presumption of innocence is a big part of that.'

Peter still looked slightly confused, but accepted Lily's explanation nonetheless.

James yawned loudly. 'Well, should we head back? We can apparate from Arabella's back yard…' His voice trailed off as Lily leapt to her feet, drawing her wand. Twisting his upper body round, he saw what she had, and what everyone else had – Aurelia Averill, clutching two children, a nasty gash on her arm and wand dangling loosely from her fingers, soot-streaks on her face, and Dumbledore was ushering her in, conjuring up a large, squashy armchair and steering her towards it.

'Aurelia, my dear, what has happened?' Dumbledore said urgently.

'Bertrand – he – they came – and' Aurelia was hysterical, her voice shaking and her body shivering. Beside her, the small boy was starting to cry, his sister clutching his hand and staring blankly at the wall opposite. Marlene McKinnon leapt to her feet.

'I'll take the children to the kitchen for some hot chocolate, shall I?' she said, taking their hands.

Aurelia jumped. 'No! They might get hurt, I have to look after them, what if they come here, what if…' and she started to sob openly, tears pouring down her face, tearing, keening noises coming from her throat.

'They'll be fine,' Marlene said gently. 'Em will come with me, to look after them, won't you Em?' Emmeline Vance nodded and stood up also. 'Come on, honey,' Marlene said to the little boy. 'There's five kittens in the kitchen – you can come and give them some milk and play with them, ok?' She ushered them gently out of the room.

'I'll go,' said Gideon Prewett, standing up and pulling on his cloak. 'I'll go and check the house, their neighbourhood.' His brother stood up to follow him.

'I'll come too,' said Fenwick. 'We – we don't know how many there could be.'

'I'll go to the Ministry,' said Frank tiredly. 'Someone has to let them know.' He got to his feet, and held out his hand to Alice, who took it without a word. The five of them left the room in silence – silence broken only by Aurelia's terrible racking sobs.

'I was upstairs,' she howled suddenly. 'Upstairs with the children, and I heard – I heard them downstairs, and then there were curses flying and they'd set the house afire and I took my babies and left and I didn't wait for him and I left him behind to die, I left him behind!' Her voice had risen to a scream. 'I left him there to die, I left him behind, oh God, what did I do, what did I do, why did I go?!'

'You saved the lives of your two children, Aurelia,' Dumbledore said softly. 'You saved Bertrand's children from a fate that should befall no child.'

Aurelia was inconsolable, crying and babbling in an incomprehensible, high pitched voice.

'Aurelia,' said Dumbledore firmly, producing a cup full of liquid from seemingly nowhere, 'you should drink this.' Aurelia grasped the cup and took a few shaky gulps. Her eyes became slightly unfocused, and her body untensed, slumping back into the seat. 'Arabella, if you could kindly take Aurelia upstairs and put her to bed – she should sleep for several hours until the Calming Draught wears off.'

He turned to Dearborn. 'Caradoc, will you please begin arrangements to have Aurelia and her family moved to a safe location – somewhere abroad, would be best, I think…Malaysia, perhaps.' He bowed his head. 'It would be best, I think, if we for the most part, avoided Bertrand's funeral service. I do not wish to have all of you in an easily compromisable location at once. Arabella, I'll come as soon as I am able in the morning.' He got to his feet once more and hurried from the room.

* * *

Later, in their flat, Lily grasped James' face between her cold hands. 'I will never leave you behind, James,' she whispered, staring at him intently. 'No matter what happens, I will never leave you behind.'

James had sudden horrible images in his mind of him being caught, somehow, and Lily refusing to leave and being horribly murdered in front of him, but he pushed them away, focusing on her beautiful, expressive, alive face in front of him and told her fervently, 'We'll stick together – always. For better or for worse, remember?'

And Lily gave a shaky little smile, and leaned in towards him, and he pointed his wand at the lamp over her shoulder and turned it out so they were in darkness.


	7. Chapter 7

**3rd of February, 1979**

They could've been back at school, back in the Gryffindor common room. Remus and Peter were sprawled on the floor amongst empty chocolate wrappers, a half-empty bag of Pepper Imps and a chessboard between them. Peters eyes were screwed up in concentration, murmuring to himself as he contemplated his next move.

'D'you think I'll be ok if I go here, James?' he asked.

'Hey!' Remus said, throwing a discarded pawn at him. 'No outside help, cheater!'

Peter groaned and stared despondently at the board. 'I'm doomed,' he said glumly. He prodded a highly unenthusiastic bishop forward with his wand, and Remus' rook leapt forward triumphantly to swipe it off the board. 'Ha!' Peter said triumphantly, and moved his queen up. 'Checkmate!'

'No way!' Remus said, sitting upright and staring at the board.

James laughed, dangling his head upside down off the couch. 'That's got to be the third time he's got you like that, Moony.'

Remus groaned and, swiping the board out of the way, flopped back to the floor. 'I should stick to playing Padfoot,' he said, rummaging amongst the chaos on the floor for another chocolate frog. 'At least I can beat him.'

'That's nothing to brag about,' James said, idly transfiguring a stray quill into a rose. 'Even Lily can beat him, and she's only played chess about twice in her life.'

He eyed the rose speculatively, and, with a flick of his wand, it had multiplied into a whole bunch of roses, which he tossed onto the table.

'Where is Padfoot?' Peter asked. James shrugged.

'On assignment somewhere – he told me yesterday he'd be away all week.' He yawned and drained his bottle of butterbeer. 'Are you going to your parents again for the full moon on the weekend, Moony?'

Remus sighed. 'Well, its not like I can just stay here in the flat, is it?' he said, a slight bitter tone to his voice. 'I'll just use the basement at home like I always did before.'

James felt a twist of guilt in his stomach. 'We would have come in January, really, Remus,' he said. Peter nodded hastily.

'I know, I know,' Remus said. 'You were all on surveillance duty that night – it's ok, really – it's not like I haven't transformed alone before.'

'We'll all be there, this weekend,' James said abruptly.

'Thanks,' Remus said, staring up at the roof.

The silence was broken by a knock at the door.

'That'll be the pizza!' Peter said, bouncing happily to his feet – but the door was already opening.

'Hey,' said Lily, depositing the pizza on the table. 'A very confused Muggle was downstairs – couldn't find the room number. Did you morons completely forget all the charms I cast on our flats? Muggles just don't notice the doors any more!'

'Ooops,' James said sheepishly. 'Er, I got you some flowers, Lily!'

He gestured at them where they lay on the table. She picked them up, a sudden soft smile on her face. 'Have you blown up the stove or something?' she said jokingly, sniffing them. Her face screwed up. 'How odd – they smell like ink!'

Peter laughed, and James threw the sofa cushions at his head.

'You're the proud recipient of one of his transfiguration experiments,' Remus told her, grinning. 'That's actually one of my quills.'

'So romantic, Prongs,' Peter said and pretended to swoon at his feet. James promptly kicked him in the knee, and ignoring Peters yelps of pain, pulled Lily over the back of the couch and onto his lap.

'Pass me a butterbeer, Remus?' she said, pulling off her mittens. 'It was freezing out today – I swear my ears are never going to be quite the same!' James took this as an invitation to nuzzle at said ears.

'Hey!' Peter said. 'Completely inappropriate display of affection!'

James leaned back against the couch, Lily leaning comfortable into his shoulder, and ruffled his hair, smirking at his friends.

* * *

**10th of February, 1979**

James yawned as he trudged wearily up the stairs to his flat. That full moon had felt particularly long – maybe because, unlike most of Moony's transformations, the entirety of this one had been spent cooped up in one small cellar, and with three large animals and one small, it had been particularly squashy. Still, it had been worth it for Remus, for him to have a full moon where he wasn't scratching and biting and hurting himself. He yawned again, wishing heartily for a mug of tea – they'd had to leave early, before Remus's parents came downstairs to let him out. Peter and Sirius had gone straight to some mission or the other, but James had the morning free, and was fully planning on sleeping the entire time. He stumbled into his kitchen, tapped the kettle with his wand and poured the instantly boiling water into his mug. Right – now to his bed, with its comfortable pillows, warm blankets…he opened the bedroom door and dropped the tea at his feet. Ignoring the scalding he felt on his lower legs, he fairly flew across the room to where Lily was huddled against the wall, legs drawn up to her chin, her robes scorched and torn, a bandage around one arm and what looked horribly like blood smeared on her head, her sleeve, her ankle…

'Lily!' He dropped at her side and grabbed her arm. 'Are you ok – what happened – what happened to you, oh merlin, I shouldn't have left you here by yourself, tell me what happened!'

'It was horrible,' she whispered, staring unseeingly at the floor. 'At the children's hospital in East London…all these Inferi came…' She shuddered. 'There were hundreds of them, and the Muggle doctors and nurses were screaming and trying to stop them coming in, but they got in and…and they were tearing children apart.' She retched convulsively and James wrapped his arms around her.

'There was only Caradoc and me there,' she said, a tear trickling down her cheek, 'and we tried to stop them, but there were too many, and the Muggles kept getting in the way, and getting burnt and we had to keep stopping to put out fires or the whole building would have gone up and the Ministry took so long to get there.' She wiped her eyes furiously. James stroked her hair comfortingly. 'Who would do this to children?' she demanded angrily. 'They hadn't done anything – anything at all to the Death Eaters, and they sent those Inferi there to slaughter them and it was the most cruel, the most senseless thing I've ever seen!' The water glass on Lily's bedside table shattered.

'This is what they do,' James said grimly. 'They don't even see Muggles as human in comparison to themselves, they think its funny that they can hurt them in ways Muggles don't understand…'

'It's not funny at all!' Lily shouted. 'How would they feel if Muggles hurt their children – tortured them to death?'

'Muggles used to burn wizarding children at the stake,' James said, thoughtlessly.

Lily leapt to her feet, wand pointed at him.

'How DARE you make excuses for them? How can you even say that – like it's the Muggles own fault they're being tortured and MURDERED?'

'No, no no,' James said, 'that's not what I meant! It was just a statement of fact – Muggles used to be afraid of us –'

'And for good reason!' Lily shrieked at him.

'I know, Lily, I KNOW! And because they were afraid we were persecuted, back in the middle ages, and Muggles did kill wizards on occasion, and some people can't get over that and they still resent Muggles and this is why things like this happen!'

'Stop making excuses!'

'I'm _not_ – this is basic Wizarding History, Lily!'

'Don't you dare be condescending! I know History as well as you do – I actually listened in the subject, I-'

'You didn't grow up with it, Lily.'

Sparks shot from Lily's wand, narrowly missing James' face.

'Just because I'm Muggleborn doesn't mean I don't get it! This – this is the entire problem with the wizarding world! You're all so arrogant and bigoted and all these old wizarding families think they're so much better than everything else in this world just because they can do magic and that gives them the right to dominate over the poor ignorant Muggles, decide what Muggles can and cannot know about the world, change the memories of Muggles, mess with their minds, KILL them!'

'We're not all like that!' James shouted back at her. 'That's not true!'

'It is true!' Lily yelled. 'Even now – we should have told them all what's happening, then at least they'd have a chance to protect themselves, they wouldn't be so confused when strange things happened, they wouldn't be sitting ducks because they'd know and they could get out!'

'We can't just tell them! That goes against everything – everything the wizarding world has been about for hundreds of years! It's best for both of us if they don't know! They wouldn't understand!'

'Tell that to the families of Muggles murdered by wizards – who think their child died in a freak accident or who don't even remember they have a child because the Ministry modified their memory so extensively! That's what they do, James – if it's totally inexplicable, sometimes they wipe their memories of the people they love! How would you feel if they did that to you? It's no better than killing them!'

'That's not the point!' James said.

'It's completely the point!' Lily screamed, tears running down her face again. She turned on her heel and stalked out of the room. He could hear her moving around in the kitchen, the living room, then she stuck her head round the door frame.

'I'm going to Marlenes,' she said stiffly.

'Right,' he said.

'I'll message you when I get there,' she told him. He didn't say anything.

She stared at him for a moment, tears still shining on her cheeks, then she was gone.

James leaned his head against the wall and closed his eyes. He opened them again. Lily wasn't there. He buried his head in his hands, feeling more alone than he'd ever felt before.


	8. Chapter 8

**10****th**** of February, 1979 – Sirius' flat**

'I can't believe she left,' James said dumbly, kicking at the couch with his heel. Remus, still looking rather pale and wan from the full moon of the night before, passed him a cup of tea. Peter had just loaded it up with several teaspoons of sugar (and Sirius had quite possibly laced it with brandy – Remus wasn't too sure about that.)

'Well, you couldn't expect all those love potions we dosed her with to last forever, James…honestly, why do you think she married you in the first place?' Sirius said. Peter kicked him in the shin, but fortunately, James was too busy wallowing in his misery to take any notice of what Sirius was saying or doing (and what he had most definitely done was spike the tea – Remus could see the bottle peeking out of the pocket in his robes.)

'She – she just marched off, and then I tried to firecall her at McKinnon's, and McKinnon threw the dustpan at me!' James continued, taking a gulp of his tea.

Sirius snorted, which he hastily disguised as a cough, glancing sheepishly at Remus, who was frowning wearily at him again. 'Er, what exactly did you say to her again?' he said, evidently attempting to be sympathetic.

'I was just trying to explain why Death Eaters and crap like them get so psycho about Muggles! Just because I told her some of them still haven't gotten over all those witch-huntings in the 14th century or whatever it was…' He drank another mouthful of tea, and promply spat it out. 'Merlin, what did you blokes put in this?'

'Real nice, James,' Peter said, 'giving the poor girl a history lesson when she's just got home from witnessing Death Eaters murder about a hundred children – just what she needed.'

'I was tired, alright?' James said grumpily.

'Just give her a day or two to cool off,' Remus said. 'You'll see her at the Order meeting on Wednesday – you can talk to her then.' James scowled at the teapot sitting in front of him, but didn't say a word.

* * *

**13 of February, 1979 – Arabella Figg's house**

'Marlene! Wait up a minute!' James jogged after Marlene as she headed out from the meeting, cloak pulled tightly around her against the drizzly grey weather.

'What do you want?' she said, regarding him as one might a particularly rotten egg.

'I was just wondering – why wasn't Lily here? Is she ok?'

'If you really must know,' Marlene told him coolly, 'she's spent the last few days bawling her eyes out, has told me repeatedly that not only do you hate her now but that you are a cold-hearted bastard who spouts historical facts when people are murdered, and came down with the flu yesterday and is refusing to use magical medicines, so she'll be sick for a while.'

James gaped. 'She's – she's being completely unreasonable! I don't _hate_ her – if anything, she hates me! Can I just come over and, I dunno, tell her I'm sorry or something?'

Marlene's face softened a little. 'She doesn't actually hate you Potter, ok? She's just incredibly upset and having a rant about it. And quite frankly, you deserve it – from what she says, you weren't exactly sympathetic about what happened at the hospital.'

'I was trying to be helpful!' James told her. 'It just all came out wrong – I wasn't excusing their behaviour at all, I was just trying to make her see why they do it, because they're idiots who hold grudges for hundreds of years!'

'Well, you can explain all that to Lily, not me,' Marlene told him quietly. 'I'm not the one who needs the apology.'

'So – so can I come over, then?' James asked hopefully.

'No,' Marlene said. 'She doesn't want to talk to you.' And with that, she slipped down the alleyway and disapparated.

James let out a strangled squawk of frustration.

'No luck?' said Sirius, who had followed him out. James shook his head, his features sinking into mask of depression.

'We've only been married a few months,' he told Sirius glumly. 'We're supposed to be happy and honeymoony still. What if she doesn't come back? Then what am I going to do?'

'I don't think I'm the best person to be asking for relationship advice,' Sirius told him. 'I mean, look at what I had for an example of a happy family…'

James just looked miserably at him.

Sirius patted him a little awkwardly on the back. 'She'll come back eventually. You just picked a really bad time to be an insensitive berk.'

'What am I supposed to say to mum?' James groaned, sinking to the ground and burying his head in his hands. 'She's expecting us both for dinner this weekend…and dad will wonder where Lily is, he adores Lily, and he's not well…I don't want to upset him.'

'Just tell them the truth,' Sirius said. 'They'll understand.'

'Yeah' James said. 'Just tell them that their son is a great fat-headed idiot who is horrible to his wife, and that she will possibly never speak to him again.'

He lifted his head up to stare at Sirius – his mouth was twitching with the effort not to burst into tears and cry like a baby.

'What if she really does hate me?'

Sirius hauled him to his feet. 'She doesn't hate you – you heard what McKinnon said, and she ought to know.' He siphoned the mud off James' robes with his wand.

'Come on, we're supposed to be outside that politician bloke's house in half an hour – moping around in the gutter won't help anything.'

And that, James knew, was as close as Sirius could get to being comforting.

* * *

**20th of February, 1979**

The four of them were standing on the side of the road, staring at it. Peter was the first to speak.

'Padfoot – what – what on earth is that monstrosity?'

'Monstrosity?' Sirius said darkly. 'This, Wormy, is a motorbike. And it's not just any old motorbike…' His voice trailed off ominously, and he leapt into the saddle. 'This motorbike can fly!' He pressed a button and, sure enough, with a roar the bike soared into the air, circled round their heads, and landed again on the road with an unpleasant clatter. 'Well?' said Sirius, crossing his arms and staring at them all. 'What do you think?'

'You're going to get arrested by the Muggle Protection office!' came a very familiar voice from behind James. He whirled around.

'Lily!'

She was studiously ignoring him, her eyes fixed on Sirius, who smiled a little sheepishly at her.

'Come on, Lily, I'm not going to fly past Arthur Weasley's nose on it…and like I'm going to let any old Muggle get their hands on this beauty!'

Lily stood, arms akimbo, frowning slightly.

'Lily – what are you – I'm – can we talk?'

Lily ignored James' mutterings. 'I'm sorry about your father,' she said to Sirius, staring intently at him. Sirius' face darkened slightly. 'I don't want to talk about that,' he said. 'How do you know, anyway?'

'Marlene's family was invited to the funeral,' Lily told him.

'Your dad died?' Peter said loudly. 'How come you didn't tell us?' Remus kicked him in the ankle, and Peter yelped.

Sirius scowled. 'As far as I'm concerned, he's not my family any more,' he said, every inch of his words and attitude conveying that he didn't care. But James had caught the brief look in his eye – a sudden look of sadness, regret, guilt – the same looked he'd had when Regulus had died. It was gone as quickly as it came, and Sirius fixed his usual devil-may-care grin on his face. 'Who wants first ride?' he asked, gesturing at the sidecar.

'You'd better not fly again – not in broad daylight!' Remus said.

Sirius rolled his eyes. 'Whatever, Prefect-Boy. Come on, Pete – we'll go off and do some hooning and leave these dullards here.'

Peter clambered into the side-car, squashing himself in uncomfortably, and then, with a hoot from Sirius, they'd roared off, the exhaust spewing smoke out behind them.

Remus glanced between James and Lily, and muttering something unintelligible, vanished inside.

The two of them stood in silence for a few moments, James trying to look Lily in the eye, and she determinedly avoiding his gaze.

'Look, I'm sorry, ok?' he said finally. 'I know I was wrong, and I shouldn't have lecture you, and-'

'No, I'm sorry,' Lily said softly, staring at her feet. 'I was being silly, and you know it – I shouldn't have overreacted.' She finally met his eye. 'I walked out on you, James, and I shouldn't have. I broke my word, and I'm really really sorry and I hope – I hope you'll forgive me?'

James stared at her bright green eyes – bright with impending tears, he realised, and deep-set with dark, sleepless shadows around them.

'It's ok,' he mumbled, holding out his arms. She stumbled into them, wrapping her arms around his neck and holding on like a drowning person, crying softly into his shoulder.

'It's ok…' he said again, stroking her hair. 'It was nobody's fault, we were all tired and stressed and the world is a nasty place to be right now…we can fight, but we'll always forgive each other, right? Because I love you, and I'd never be angry at you…'

Lily hugged him tighter still. 'I'm sorrier,' she whispered, 'and I love you more.'

'No,' he said, a shade of a grin forming, 'I love you more,'

'I love you the most,' she said, smiling at him, and he laughed and twirled her around. All was right in his world, as terrible as it might be, because Lily Potter was smiling at him again.


	9. Chapter 9

**25****th**** of February, 1979**

James stared intently at his wife's face. His wife…he still laughed maniacally inside his head every time he said or thought those two words, and now that she'd come back to him, he liked to think them and say them as often as he could. It was 10 am in the morning, a cold and blustery day, and Lily was sprawled on the couch, fast asleep. Her face was drawn and slightly haggard, courtesy of several late nights keeping watch for the Order, her hair was rumpled and in need of a wash, she had smudges of jam from breakfast on her chin and she was snoring, but, James decided, she was utterly adorable even now…perhaps he ought to take a photograph to immortalise the occasion. He rocked back on his heels, considering it…no, he liked having Lily around again too much to do anything that might antagonise her once more. He grinned as she gave a little start, and turned over, burrowing deeper into the cushions. Planting a kiss on the side of her head, he unwound his long frame and popped out the door and across the hall.

'Morning, sunshines!' he said, beaming.

Peter grunted. Sirius threw a shoe at him.

'Wozza time?' Remus said groggily.

'Its after ten, so get your lazy arses out of bed…haven't we all got better things to be doing?'

Remus groaned and rolled over, sticking his head under his pillow. Sirius threw his second shoe.

'Piss off, Prongs, we aren't all married and fuddy-duddy and domesticated like you. No-one should be up before eleven on the weekend.'

'Its not the weekend,' James told him cheerily. 'It's Monday.'

'Fine – weekday, what's the difference, its not like any of us have nine to fives is it?'

Peter gave a groan, and sat up slowly, clutching his head.

'What was in that?' he moaned, squinting at Sirius.

'What happened to him?' James asked interestedly, looking at Peter. 'He's a good shade of green, isn't he?'

Sirius surveyed Peter proudly.

'Yep – my drink-mixing can't be beat, can it, Wormy my love?'

Peter muttered something under his breath, trying to scowl, but it came out as more of a wince.

'Want some nice scrambled eggs for breakfast?' James said, grinning. 'Or maybe some sausages…bacon…'

He and Sirius laughed as Peter retched, and fairly flew to the bathroom.

Remus gave a frustrated gurgle and flung his blankets across the room, stumbling to his feet.

'Never again am I drinking anything you even pour,' he told Sirius. 'Never.'

'What did you blokes do?' James asked.

'We hit the town for some fun,' Sirius said, 'and I treated these to a few Sirius Specials.'

'Without me?' James said, feeling a bit put out. 'I mean, I might be married and domesticated and whatever, but I'm pretty sure I can outdrink all of you…'

'We did knock,' Sirius said, grinning wickedly at him. 'Loudly. But no one answered. 'Spose you were up to some fun of your own last night – the married sort, eh?'

James went pink around the collar.

'Yeah,' he retorted. 'Washing the dishes, folding the laundry, feeding the cat, that sort of thing.'

'You haven't got a cat,' Remus yawned.

James whacked the back of his head, rolling his eyes.

When Lily came in three hours later, the four of them were about half-way through consuming the entire contents of the fridge, exploding snap cards scattered and smouldering about the room. Sirius and Peter had enchanted the cutlery and were overseeing a rather complex looking battle, and 'You cheated, Moony! You can't do that!' James had just been beaten at chess.

'Morning,' she said.

'More like afternoon!' Sirius said, smashing Peters fork out of the air. 'Had a late night, did you, Lily?' He smirked at her. James reached out and grabbed him in a headlock, tackling him into the floor.

'Yes, actually,' Lily told him coolly. 'We had a wild time – but then, you wouldn't know much about that sort of thing, would you, seeing as you haven't exactly had a girlfriend.'

Sirius made an odd choking noise and ducked out of James' reach. He straightened up, ignoring Peters and Remus' sniggers and Lily's smirk.

'Have we got anything for lunch?' James asked Lily, flopping onto his back and staring up at her. She raised an eyebrow at him and looked pointedly at the remains of a roast chicken, a near-decimated loaf of bread and a cake reduced to crumbs.

'That's just breakfast,' James told her. 'We're growing men, you know.'

'Yeah,' Peter said. 'Growing out, maybe.'

'I'm not fat!' James said indignantly. 'Remus, tell him I'm not fat!'

'James isn't fat,' Remus said obligingly. 'He's a weedy, wimpy looking little thing.'

Lily snorted with laughter.

'Mock all you will,' James told her haughtily. 'I may be tall and thin, but you married me and are stuck with me now.'

'We're stuck with you too, and we didn't even marry you,' Sirius told him. 'Our only crime was to go to school with you… you have to keep this husband of yours under better control, Lily, he came over here at some ridiculous hour and woke us all up from our well-deserved slumber…'

'You were hung-over!' James said. 'Sinners, all of you. I should have made you do laps of the park or something.'

'I'd like to see you try,' Remus muttered.

'I could,' James said plaintively, 'but I can't because I'm faint with hunger, and Lily won't tell me if we have any food.'

'There's left-over roast beef and potatoes,' she told him, 'but I'm not walking all the way back to get you food.' She prodded a mound of cushions suspiciously with her toe, and sat down on them, curling up in a distinctly cat-like manner.

'You go get it, Peter,' James said lazily. Peter sighed and got up.

'Make him get it himself,' Lily said, catching hold of Peters hand and pulling him back down. 'He's lazy enough as it is, without you aiding and abetting.'

'You're a cruel girl, Lily,' James said, 'turning my friends against me.' He pulled out his wand and smirked at her. 'Then again, I can summon all the food I want and not move an inch.' He jabbed his wand once in the direction of his apartment. Seconds later, the dish of leftovers came soaring into the room, skidding to a halt just above James. Several pieces of potato flew out and landed on his chest.

'Such a waste of good food,' Peter said in an elaborate show of mourning.

'I don't think so!' James scooped the potatoes up and crammed them into his mouth.

'You're disgusting, you know,' Lily told him, shaking her head.

'I'm disgusting?' James said. 'What about him?' He pointed at Sirius. 'He goes and buys a motorbike that flies…what a waste of gold…you could buy out Honeydukes with that many Galleons…'

Five hundred miles away, in a small, non-descript cottage centred in a paddock, an elderly wizard was pacing his parlour. 'Join us, and be safe, they say,' he muttered. "Join us and fight'.' He spun around and walked back to the window, peering out between the raindrops anxiously. Pointing his wand at the blinds, they drew themselves, and the room darkened. The wizard tapped his fingers nervously on the sill, staring unseeingly at the walls of his home. On the mantelpiece, in a wizarding photograph, a laughing girl smiled and waved at him, holding up the hand of a baby and waving it too. He looked at the image for a moment, the tenseness around his eyes lessening for a moment, and then he frowned, and a muscle in his jaw twitched, and he turned away, fingers drumming on the window sill. He sighed heavily, and then turned to an old wooden desk and removed a sheet of parchment. Five minutes later, he opened the front door a smidgen, and out flew a miniature owl, a tightly rolled scroll attached to its leg. He watched it fly away into the cloud and mist, and then closed the door tightly.

* * *

**27****th**** of February, 1979**

It was nearing the end of the Order meeting, and James was tired. Exhausted from a long day spent watching, waiting nervously at various places in Muggle England, weary of the ever-increasing reports of atrocities being committed, always in places they hadn't thought to go, the people they hadn't protected vanishing silently from the streets. Sometimes, the bodies showed up days, weeks later. Sometimes, people just disappeared, existing only in the memories of those they left behind. He shifted in his seat, an unpleasant prickle running down the back of his neck. Beside him, Lily reached out and took his hand, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye. He held her hand tightly in his, leaning back in his chair and wishing just to sleep for hours, to go a week without the worry that always squirmed in the back of his mind, to be able to have a day at home with his friends and family just having fun without the guilt that came afterwards.

'Potter,' Moody said, leaning across the table towards him. 'Old Mardicus – Mardicus Egg – contacted Dumbledore last night. We've been trying to get him to help us out for months, but he's pretty unwilling to be seen as taking sides – anyway, he's putting out that he might be changing his mind. Would you be able to go see him sometime tomorrow, let him know the protections we can give him, give his family, if he helps us.'

James nodded, knowing full well that although they could provide layers of protective charms and spells for the homes of their members, there was always the risk, every time they went on a mission, every time they walked out the front door, and they couldn't protect each other all the time.

'Who else is going?' he asked. Moody shrugged. 'Haven't asked anyone else yet. Take Lupin or Black if they're free – but don't go alone, it could be an ambush yet.' He slid a piece of parchment over the table. 'Here's how to get there – and keep an eye out. Have to stay vigilant, in these times.'

James took the parchment and read it, committing the details to memory, before touching it with the tip of his wand and burning it. Moody nodded in satisfaction, and turned back to where the Longbottoms and the Pepperdines were arguing over Auror deployment patterns.

'Padfoot,' James said in an undertone. 'You free any time tomorrow? Moody wants me to go check out Egg up in Kent, see if we can recruit him.' Sirius nodded.

'I can probably get away from London for about half an hour, at noon. That'll be long enough?'

James nodded. 'Meet me at the flat at twelve,' he said. 'We'll apparate from there.'

* * *

**28****th**** February, 1979**

James and Sirius walked along the road, Sirius twirling his wand idly between his fingers. 'You should put that away,' James told him. 'This is a Muggle area, remember?'

Sirius rolled his eyes. 'Don't be such a goody-goody, Prongs. There's nobody around – besides, its hardly likely a Muggle would notice it for what it is.' He gave the wand an extra flourish, and a multitude of purple sparks shot out the end.

'Yeah, completely inane, isn't it?' James hissed, glancing back at the town behind them.

'Live a little, why don't you?' Sirius said. James shrugged, and didn't bother to reply. They walked on in silence for a few minutes, walking in and out of patches of crisp winter sun where it shone through gaps in the hedgerow.

'How much further?' Sirius asked.

'Just around the corner, I think,' James said. 'It's in a sort of paddock thing, Moody said.'

'I don't see why we couldn't apparate a bit closer,' Sirius said, kicking at the stones on the edge of the road.

'We could've,' James grinned, 'but I thought you needed the exercise, you lazy dog.'

Sirius aimed a kick at James' ankles, but missed. Laughing, they rounded the corner and caught their first glimpse of Egg's cottage.

James heart actually skipped a beat – the front door was swinging open, he could see even from here that the windows were smashed, the blinds torn and broken, and there were shadowy figures moving about – 'hurry!' hissed Sirius from beside him, and without further thought, he apparated straight into the garden. He sensed, rather than saw, Sirius arrive beside him, and then a sickly-yellow curse went flying past him – he could feel the heat from it tingling on his ear. 'Stupefy!' he shouted, pointing his wand in the general direction of the house – he heard some yells from inside, good, he must've got one…Sirius pulled him forward and they dashed up to the wall, James chanced a quick peek round the doorframe, and pulled back just as quick – something malevolent and purple had just missed his face. Sirius shot a stream of jinxes inside, and James could hear jumbled voices swearing – he pointed his own wand round the edge and let loose. Something hit his exposed hand, and a curious burning sensation crept up his arm – he yelped and dropped almost dropped his wand, catching it in his other hand just in time. Sirius shot off a particularly impressive Blasting Curse which rattled the very roof of the house, and dragged James back from the door by the shirtneck. 'You ok?' he said, still watching the suddenly quiet house.

James prodded his arm gingerly with his wand and nodded. 'Yeah,' he said. 'Don't think it'll do anything permanent.' Sirius nodded tersely.

'You think they're still in there?' he said, jerking his head towards the cottage. James shrugged. 'Check?'

Sirius nodded again, conjured a mirror, levitating it in front of the door. 'See anything?' he asked, squinting at it.

'No,' James said. He edged cautiously round the side of the door – nothing. The room was deserted, furniture scattered, a few scorch marks on the walls and the rug smouldering slightly.

'No-one here,' he said. They walked in, looking around them. A puff of wind blew in and ruffled the curtain – James jumped a little.

'Professor Egg?' he called out. Silence.

'Homenum revelio!' Sirius said, making a wide, sweeping movement with his wand. Nothing.

'Maybe he's dead,' James said, striding into the next room. It was empty. So was the next, and the next.

'Maybe he got away,' Sirius said, peering round the room as though he expected someone to reappear any minute. 'Yeah,' James said, walking over to the fireplace.

'You see any floo powder?'

'It's spilt all over the floor,' Sirius told him. James scooped up a pinch between his fingers. 'Watch my back,' he said, and throwing the glittering green powder onto the fireplace, he stuck his head into the flames and said clearly 'Department of Magical Law Enforcement!'

A sickening swirl later, and he was staring at the face of a frazzled witch.

'Name?' she said, shaking excess ink off her quill.

'James Potter – could you send someone to Mardicus Eggs'? There's been an attack – Death Eaters.'

'Location?' said the witch, not even blinking.

'About 20 miles north of Smeeth – just past a Muggle village, Summerby, I think it is.'

The parchment the witch was writing on folded itself into a dart and zoomed out of James' sight.

'Thank you for your call,' the witch said. 'Representatives of the Department will be along shortly – please stay out of sight and remain cautious until they arrive.'

James pulled his head out of the fire and sneezed, soot falling lightly from his hair.

'Well?' Sirius said.

'Someone'll be here soon,' James said, straightening up. 'Wait outside, d'you reckon?'

Moody turned up five minutes after the official representatives had arrived.

'Stand down, Shacklebolt, they're with me,' he barked at the tall man who'd been grilling Sirius and James since he got there – James vaguely recognised him as someone who'd left Hogwarts a few years before he had.

Shacklebolt grinned at them. 'Sorry about that – can't be too careful, you know.' And he strode briskly to join the rest of the throng now gathering around the cottage.

Sirius scowled at his back – he hadn't been too pleased about the suspicious manner the Aurors had treated them with.

'Any trace of Egg when you got here?' Moody said shortly.

'No – just a bunch of what were probably Death Eaters,' James said. 'About five of them, wouldn't you say?'

Sirius nodded.

'Recognise anyone?' Moody said.

'Yeah,' Sirius said. 'One bloke – looked familiar, think he might've known my father, name's Karkaroff.'

'Right,' Moody growled. 'I'll get someone onto that. You two get going to wherever you're meant to be – stay VIGILANT!'

'Yes sir!' James said (it was all he could do to stop himself mock-saluting). Moody grumbled something under his breath and stalked over to where three Ministry officials were having a huddled conversation, and a blonde reporter in an acid-green cloak was clearly trying to listen in.

'Back to London?' he said to Sirius, who shrugged half-heartedly.

'Yeah. Rather be doing something, you know?'

'You can always clean the bathrooms,' James said, smirking. Sirius snorted.

'Sure – and once I'm done, I'll iron your hankies, shall I?'

'I thought you'd never ask,' James said. Sirius reached out to whack the back of his head, so James hastily apparated away.

_A/N  
Chapter Three has been edited to fix continuity details about Sirius' motorbike - completely forgot during the Lily/James reunion that Sirius had mentioned already owning a bike! Thank you to everyone who has reviewed, and read, so far, and I hope the story is meeting your expectations!  
:) flutterby_


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